SOUTHERN LIGHTS: ‘The Stadium’ is Tuscaloosa's top landmark

Published: Sunday, November 25, 2012 at 3:30 a.m.

Last Modified: Saturday, November 24, 2012 at 8:08 p.m.

In 1999, I was a member of a committee charged with coming up with a Year 2000 commemorative coin for Tuscaloosa.

The front of the coin was easy. Participating New York Times-owned newspapers formed “partnerships” with local institutions to produce events and souvenirs of the millennium, and marketers had given us the obvious concept: “Celebrate 2000.” So that’s what the front said.

It was to be pretty standard in all the participating communities.

The reverse was more problematic. We were supposed to agree on a landmark that symbolized Tuscaloosa and submit artwork on it.

In some cities, I suppose, the landmark-symbol is pretty obvious. Birmingham has Vulcan. Enterprise has the boll weevil statue. St. Louis has the arch.

But Tuscaloosa? What is the city’s symbol?

Nothing came readily to mind, so we kicked around all kinds of things. Denny Chimes. The Drish House. The old building at Bryce Hospital. The Hugh Thomas Bridge.

One by one, they all got shot down. We wound up putting the University of Alabama’s President’s Mansion on the coin.

That choice wasn’t really barf-worthy, though nobody on the committee was really happy about it. Fortunately, the mansion looked pretty good on the coin, which is something of a collector’s item today.

The mansion had a history, too. Completed in 1849, it initially was criticized by the Legislature as being “unnecessarily lavish.” It was pretty highfalutin for a town where most of the structures were rickety shacks and log cabins.

Then there was that nasty piece of business in 1865 when the conquering Yankees tried to burn it. The UA president’s wife is supposed to have talked them out of it.

I like the mansion. As editorial editor of The Tuscaloosa News, I got invited to lunch there on homecoming weekends. One of those times, I met a famous UA quarterback who I had seen a few years earlier when he was crazy drunk and repeatedly threw a knife into a wall in a back room at the Flora-Bama Lounge.

There were no knives thrown that homecoming in the president’s mansion.

In retrospect, however, I think we got it wrong for the coin. We should have picked the only Tuscaloosa landmark that thousands, perhaps millions, of people know: Bryant-Denny Stadium.

Perhaps we passed it over because Alabama’s football team, led by head coach Mike DuBose, had just emerged from a dismal 7-5 season. We’d beaten Auburn in Auburn, and that was good, but we’d lost to Arkansas, Florida, Mississippi State and Virginia Tech (in the lowly Music City Bowl). It was not a season to remember and perhaps we didn’t want the stadium reminding us of it.

Yet from this perspective, the choice seems obvious. Not only is Bryant-Denny the biggest thing around, but it also is the only Tuscaloosa structure that many out-of-towners know, especially fans like me who never spent a day as a student there.

I’ve noticed that the university is trying to get that kind of fan to enroll, to strengthen bonds (and feed the kitty in the process).

To local people and former UA students, all you have to do is say “The Stadium,” and they know immediately what you’re talking about, even though the town abounds with stadiums. It’s like when older Southerners talked about “The War” and you know they didn’t mean World War I or the Spanish-American War.

Bryant-Denny Stadium — named for a great coach and a great UA president — is a huge, yawning edifice but still, most Saturdays these days it’s filled with people. Every one of the 101,821 seats is sold.

Tuscaloosa’s official population, 91,605, is about 10,000 less than the stadium holds. On football Saturdays, we come close to popping our buttons.

The stadium is an eye-popper. I got to take a tour of part of it just a few years back. Not only does it have a field and dressing rooms, but it also contains a boggling array of facilities: reception rooms, an air-conditioned lounge, food preparation areas, media spaces — you name it.

The best part of Bryant-Denny, however, is the memories that it holds.

I’m old enough to remember when Paul W. “Bear” Bryant would saunter out before a game at Bryant-Denny and lean on one of the goal posts, taking in everything from the crowd to the weather.

There are also memories of Joe Namath, while he could still run.

And there are memories of other great players, including a kid quarterback named Kenny Stabler who threw a ball as well he did a knife. When he came out to play, the students hissed “sssssSnake!”

Later on, he was the best radio color man ever on UA games. But that was a lot later.

One Saturday, I looked out at the swarm of crimson and white-clad fans converging on the stadium and I had the banal but head-rattling thought that every one of them probably had a strong memory — good or bad — of Bryant-Denny.

We should have put it on the coin.

In its own way, Bryant-Denny is almost as impressive as that landmark-symbol of Rome, the Colosseum (originally called the Flavian Amphitheatre).

The Colosseum was finished in 80 A.D. — about 1,850 years before Bryant-Denny first opened in 1929 — but even so, it had a couple of wrinkles that the Tuscaloosa landmark lacks.

One was an awning that rolled out over the 50,000 Colosseum spectators. Anyone who has had to suffer the late afternoon September sun or a drenching winter shower at Bryant-Denny would have a deep appreciation of an awning.

Another thing was a system of elevators that would allow killer animals to pop up in front of gladiators in the Colosseum.

Imagine if they had that at Bryant-Denny! The whole Alabama football team could suddenly pop up, fire in their eyes, scaring off Floridas, Auburns and Tennessees.

You’re not likely to see that kind of thing at Bryant-Denny any more than the use of the stadium for naval battles, another unique feature of the Colosseum.

Undoubtedly, that omission is a good thing. So is the fact that nobody at Bryant-Denny is likely to get killed on a thumb symbol like the one they used at the Colosseum — though I must admit, there are plenty of times that I wished we had the same power to execute some of the gridiron gladiators who fought us. Steve Spurrier would not be coaching at South Carolina if we did.

On a family trip to Rome 50 years ago, I got to see the bloody old Colosseum. A lot of it has been mined away over the centuries, but what remains is stupendous.

I imagine a lot of Bryant-Denny will remain to awe the future 1,800 years from now. Tornadoes come through this part of Alabama, but the stadium looks pretty substantial.

What I remember most from the Colosseum of a half-century ago was all the cats that lived there. It seemed that half of Rome’s felines were Colosseum residents, though according to one website, only 200 of Rome’s 300,000 cats live there today.

Still, that’s impressive. I wonder if cats will outlive football in Tuscaloosa?

Somehow, I kind of doubt it.

Ben Windham is retired editorial editor of The Tuscaloosa News. His email address is Swind15443@aol.com.

<p>In 1999, I was a member of a committee charged with coming up with a Year 2000 commemorative coin for Tuscaloosa.</p><p>The front of the coin was easy. Participating New York Times-owned newspapers formed “partnerships” with local institutions to produce events and souvenirs of the millennium, and marketers had given us the obvious concept: “Celebrate 2000.” So that's what the front said.</p><p>It was to be pretty standard in all the participating communities.</p><p>The reverse was more problematic. We were supposed to agree on a landmark that symbolized Tuscaloosa and submit artwork on it.</p><p>In some cities, I suppose, the landmark-symbol is pretty obvious. Birmingham has Vulcan. Enterprise has the boll weevil statue. St. Louis has the arch.</p><p>But Tuscaloosa? What is the city's symbol?</p><p>Nothing came readily to mind, so we kicked around all kinds of things. Denny Chimes. The Drish House. The old building at Bryce Hospital. The Hugh Thomas Bridge.</p><p>One by one, they all got shot down. We wound up putting the University of Alabama's President's Mansion on the coin.</p><p>That choice wasn't really barf-worthy, though nobody on the committee was really happy about it. Fortunately, the mansion looked pretty good on the coin, which is something of a collector's item today.</p><p>The mansion had a history, too. Completed in 1849, it initially was criticized by the Legislature as being “unnecessarily lavish.” It was pretty highfalutin for a town where most of the structures were rickety shacks and log cabins.</p><p>Then there was that nasty piece of business in 1865 when the conquering Yankees tried to burn it. The UA president's wife is supposed to have talked them out of it.</p><p>I like the mansion. As editorial editor of The Tuscaloosa News, I got invited to lunch there on homecoming weekends. One of those times, I met a famous UA quarterback who I had seen a few years earlier when he was crazy drunk and repeatedly threw a knife into a wall in a back room at the Flora-Bama Lounge. </p><p>There were no knives thrown that homecoming in the president's mansion.</p><p>In retrospect, however, I think we got it wrong for the coin. We should have picked the only Tuscaloosa landmark that thousands, perhaps millions, of people know: Bryant-Denny Stadium.</p><p>Perhaps we passed it over because Alabama's football team, led by head coach Mike DuBose, had just emerged from a dismal 7-5 season. We'd beaten Auburn in Auburn, and that was good, but we'd lost to Arkansas, Florida, Mississippi State and Virginia Tech (in the lowly Music City Bowl). It was not a season to remember and perhaps we didn't want the stadium reminding us of it.</p><p>Yet from this perspective, the choice seems obvious. Not only is Bryant-Denny the biggest thing around, but it also is the only Tuscaloosa structure that many out-of-towners know, especially fans like me who never spent a day as a student there. </p><p>I've noticed that the university is trying to get that kind of fan to enroll, to strengthen bonds (and feed the kitty in the process).</p><p>To local people and former UA students, all you have to do is say “The Stadium,” and they know immediately what you're talking about, even though the town abounds with stadiums. It's like when older Southerners talked about “The War” and you know they didn't mean World War I or the Spanish-American War.</p><p>Bryant-Denny Stadium — named for a great coach and a great UA president — is a huge, yawning edifice but still, most Saturdays these days it's filled with people. Every one of the 101,821 seats is sold.</p><p>Tuscaloosa's official population, 91,605, is about 10,000 less than the stadium holds. On football Saturdays, we come close to popping our buttons.</p><p>The stadium is an eye-popper. I got to take a tour of part of it just a few years back. Not only does it have a field and dressing rooms, but it also contains a boggling array of facilities: reception rooms, an air-conditioned lounge, food preparation areas, media spaces — you name it.</p><p>The best part of Bryant-Denny, however, is the memories that it holds. </p><p>I'm old enough to remember when Paul W. “Bear” Bryant would saunter out before a game at Bryant-Denny and lean on one of the goal posts, taking in everything from the crowd to the weather.</p><p>There are also memories of Joe Namath, while he could still run.</p><p>And there are memories of other great players, including a kid quarterback named Kenny Stabler who threw a ball as well he did a knife. When he came out to play, the students hissed “sssssSnake!”</p><p>Later on, he was the best radio color man ever on UA games. But that was a lot later.</p><p>One Saturday, I looked out at the swarm of crimson and white-clad fans converging on the stadium and I had the banal but head-rattling thought that every one of them probably had a strong memory — good or bad — of Bryant-Denny. </p><p>We should have put it on the coin.</p><p>In its own way, Bryant-Denny is almost as impressive as that landmark-symbol of Rome, the Colosseum (originally called the Flavian Amphitheatre).</p><p>The Colosseum was finished in 80 A.D. — about 1,850 years before Bryant-Denny first opened in 1929 — but even so, it had a couple of wrinkles that the Tuscaloosa landmark lacks.</p><p>One was an awning that rolled out over the 50,000 Colosseum spectators. Anyone who has had to suffer the late afternoon September sun or a drenching winter shower at Bryant-Denny would have a deep appreciation of an awning.</p><p>Another thing was a system of elevators that would allow killer animals to pop up in front of gladiators in the Colosseum. </p><p>Imagine if they had that at Bryant-Denny! The whole Alabama football team could suddenly pop up, fire in their eyes, scaring off Floridas, Auburns and Tennessees.</p><p>You're not likely to see that kind of thing at Bryant-Denny any more than the use of the stadium for naval battles, another unique feature of the Colosseum. </p><p>Undoubtedly, that omission is a good thing. So is the fact that nobody at Bryant-Denny is likely to get killed on a thumb symbol like the one they used at the Colosseum — though I must admit, there are plenty of times that I wished we had the same power to execute some of the gridiron gladiators who fought us. Steve Spurrier would not be coaching at South Carolina if we did.</p><p>On a family trip to Rome 50 years ago, I got to see the bloody old Colosseum. A lot of it has been mined away over the centuries, but what remains is stupendous. </p><p>I imagine a lot of Bryant-Denny will remain to awe the future 1,800 years from now. Tornadoes come through this part of Alabama, but the stadium looks pretty substantial.</p><p>What I remember most from the Colosseum of a half-century ago was all the cats that lived there. It seemed that half of Rome's felines were Colosseum residents, though according to one website, only 200 of Rome's 300,000 cats live there today.</p><p>Still, that's impressive. I wonder if cats will outlive football in Tuscaloosa?</p><p>Somehow, I kind of doubt it.</p><p>Ben Windham is retired editorial editor of The Tuscaloosa News. His email address is Swind15443@aol.com.</p>